Guilt No More laundry -- Lenten edition

This is not a joke.The ironing board stack.


Go away for the weekend, avoid menial work on the Lord's Day, and this is what you get!
Happy Holy Week. If you want to find me, I'll be praying in the basement.

Crap chairs, part 3 -- oh yeah, baby

If this chair were a car, it would be our old Vanagon: faint traces of style, underneath layers and layers of misery.This is one of the few pieces of furniture -- oh, OK, the only piece -- that I ever refinished myself. It used to be standard 70's brown, and I updated it! It had a fuzzy pink seat, which used to look halfway nice when it was owned by my long-suffering parents. What you see here is blue vinyl (cheap!) and black spray paint. It never looked VERY nice, but at this point, we're just hoping that the arson fairy visits soon and takes JUST THIS CHAIR. Even the smoldering heap of blackened sticks will be preferable to what this is now. And Sweetums can sit on a pile of phone books, since we get a new stack of them every three weeks here in the City Where Nothing is Allowed.

Crap chairs, part 2

If this chair were music, it would be the Beatles last album -- the one they would have released when they were eighty-five.This excrescence used to be a plain old beige recliner. We found it (on the boulevard) when it had already had a long full life in front of someone's TV. But soon after, this crap chair had a major disabling life event: it died. The arms are almost off, and the recliner part falls off when you sit down. Not to mention that it was no color to begin with and is now a dirty no-color.

We'd put it back on the boulevard but we are too embarrassed, because the boulevard we found it on is our next-door-neighbor's. We can't bear to see them smirk when they find it no longer usable, on our boulevard.

Crap Chairs, part 1

If this chair were in Grandpa's house, he would call it the "magic chair," because magic duct tape is the only thing holding it together. Also because some kind of curse must have been placed upon us such that we have had this chair for so long. Has it been a year and a day? Where is the prince to come and kiss this odious toad?

Well, tonight a princess did the deed for us, albeit not with a kiss but with her backside. She sat in it. How dare she? And it broke. The seat broke right off. I guess the spell on the duct tape had been finally broken.

We will not be posting the picture of this nasty thing broken. Just imagine it, though. We'll be throwing it in the river where it belongs very very soon.

Stay tuned for more Crap Chairs. This series is conceived and photographed, and co-written, by Buster, the guy with an eye for chairs.

What isn't working around here -- and what is

Here is an area of our Guilt No More castle that the scullery maid (me) insists does not work. There are too many things going on: lined up items to be put in the recycling bags (which are nestled behind the right door), aprons hung over brackets since I am too sissy to learn how to use a drill properly, the paper-recycling brown bag, the garbage, and the totally necessary but incredibly irritating laundry hamper. Not to mention, the yard stick! Never tell me we don't utilize our shelf brackets! Oh yeah, and look at the empty milk jug. We have so many of these I begin to feel they are sort of like pets.

How would we make this better? It is ridiculously easy, once I take the time to think about it. But the only way I can bear to think about it -- and this corner of our kitchen has annoyed me seriously for years!!! -- is to blog about it. Pathetic, yet true.

As I was saying, it wouldn't be hard to make this an easier corner to live with. First, put the recycling under the sink, rather than in the back hall. Next, install a hook for the aprons (which since this photo was taken has actually happened). Next, remove the laundry hamper and find another place for it. Maybe the back hall! Never tell me we don't utilize our back hall! It's a Mud Room. And by mud, I mean mud.
Now, having glutted ourselves in our filthy disorganization, let us turn our little eyes happily to a place in the house that is currently working, and which is now so nice I had to take a photo from every angle: The Red Room. And by red I do mean red.

As you stand in the doorway this is what you see to the right. A desk with enough space. Bookshelves properly filled.
And here, below, you see almost straight ahead. Note the little window seat that my dear Superguy made since he knows I've always wanted one. Of course, it's too narrow to accommodate my motherly self, but see the last photo of this post for its ultimate use. And note also here, more bookshelves, the pretty rocker that doesn't fit anywhere else, and the sole closet on the main floor, which houses the vacuum! The vacuum misses the back hall, but I don't care. It has to stay here, forever and ever.
And here is what you would see if you stepped in and pivoted to the left. Look! More shelves! And the homeschool dresser, another desk which a child could sit at (and they do!), and a white board which has subsequently been consigned to the Dumpster because someone wrote on it with a Sharpie instead of the approved marker. Never tell me we don't use our Dumpster.
Oh. My. Heavens! Look at the window seat. It is fulfilling its very raison d'etre -- little girl cousins, dressed as princesses, reading. In the sunlight. In a room that works.
It fills me with glee.